Ballots to remain uncounted in MI and Stein blocked in Philly. Guest: Election integrity, law expert Paul Lehto says this proves 'only option is to get it right on Election Night'. Also: Trump taps climate denier, fossil-fuel tool for EPA...

Yesterday, during my KPFK/Pacifica interview on Wednesday with citizen journalist and fearless video live-streamer Spencer Mills (better known to the world as "OakFoSho") about his remarkable coverage of the Tuesday Night/Wednesday morning LAPD raid of OccupyLA at Los Angeles City Hall, we discussed a moment when an LAPD officer had, inappropriately, pointed a gun at him, and Mills' fearless attempt to take the officer to task for it.

"Escamilla is pointing his gun at protesters," Mills is heard saying on the video. The officer then points the gun towards the sky, and then lowers it briefly straight at the camera as the journalist's video-camera records the moment for posterity.

"That's not necessary! You just pointed your weapon right at me!," Mills shouts to the cop. "That's not necessary!...It's against procedure and it's against code and you're not supposed to do it! Take your finger off the trigger, please. Thank you! Don't point your weapon at me. It's against procedure and its against code. I'm a journalist! I'm allowed to be here!"

"Again, his name is Escamilla," Mills says near the end of the clip, before spelling out his name. "E-S-C-A-M-I-L-L-A. I believe he just broke procedure."

Prior to the show yesterday, I wasn't able to find the audio from the incident, which I had seen live as it occurred on OakFoSho/Mills' live-stream, but RT (Russian television) apparently noticed it, and highlighted it yesterday. Here's that moment...

Also, as we've been quite complimentary, in general, towards the way the LAPD handled the eviction from the park in a surprisingly peaceful way (versus the appalling example set by other cities where police sparked violence by the use of pepper spray, tear gas, and more against peaceful demonstrators), it seems, in addition to the above, a bit more video is helpful for balance.

"OccupyFreedomLA," the other video live-streamer who joined me in-studio at KPFK on Wednesday to discuss her coverage, sends along the following video captured that same night and aired by KCBS2/KCAL9 (yes, their news divisions are now merged), showing exceedingly rough treatment by the LAPD of a photojournalist in the park that night. "It could have been us," she notes, in the tweet accompanying the link she sent to both me and "OakFoSho"...

We can't see what sparks the LAPD behavior in the above video, so we'll reserve judgment until we learn more. But, in any case, with that caveat, here's the way the video above is described by the poster at YouTube...

Photojournalist Tyson Zoltan Heder, who was photographing the events of Occupy Los Angeles and the LAPD evicting the protesters, was beaten by the police and had his camera taken, and then he was detained and charged with "assault", and at the time of uploading this video he remains in police custody. Watch the video and see if you can see anyone doing any "assault" to anyone else. I'll give you a hint: Tyson isn't the perpetrator of any assault, he's the one who GETS assaulted.

Yesterday I posted an account of the Bangor Daily News censoring pro Occupier comments on their online website in ME. Bangor Daily News is read mid state and all the way to the Canadian Border.

Yesterday, the Occupy comments had gone from around 100 for each article to 8.One of the anti Occupy comments stated the FBI might pay a visit to a commentor.

Today, there are 3 Occupy comments on the Occupy article. So, I guess they are having the desired effect. Shut down discussion.

The Bangor Daily News used to be the best newspaper that I had ever read. They will suffer from advertising revenues as a result of the censorship. Shame. It is the system.

COMMENT #3 [Permalink]...
The whole world is watching.
said on 12/2/2011 @ 4:19 am PT...

Thank you for posting video of these incidents!

Nearly every description of the Occupy LA raid I've seen in the media parroted the claim of the mayor and police chief that all officers used "minimal force", yet these examples clearly contradict that claim.

Since the "media pool" was excluded from the activity in the interior of the park, these are our only glimpses into what actually happened there.

There was another example of police using excessive force that was broadcast live by KCAL9. To the best of my recollection, four male officers pinned a physically small young woman down onto the concrete with their knees, and one of them seemed to actually use the weight of his body to smash his knee into her neck/upper back, forcing her face into the pavement.

The only video I've been able to find of this incident is a secondary video of a TV screen during the live broadcast. This clip begins during the middle of the event, after the worst of the violence:

Perhaps someone can obtain the original video of the whole incident from KCAL9?

COMMENT #4 [Permalink]...
The whole world is watching.
said on 12/2/2011 @ 4:30 am PT...

Reviewing the videos of "Tyson Zoltan Heder" and the "girl with pink pants", it seems that their arrests may be associated and possibly happened at the same time. (Is Heder the individual being arrested in the background of the video of the "girl with pink pants"?)

This could make it easier to obtain KCAL9 footage of the young woman's arrest.

If the Senate Bill becomes law they could have military people there who could accuse @OakFoSho of terrorism then seize him and take him to GITMO and hold him there indefinitely without formal charges or trial.

DREDD @ #5, We won't have to wait for it to become law. It's already in the books, as I posted on your blog...

President Obama's January 21, 2009 Patriot Acts (plural). "Anyone stating a radical change to (US) Government is a Homegrown Domestic Terrorist". If you start to do the research into President Obama's January 21, 2009 Patriot Acts and find "Indefinite Detentions" then you are on the right track.

Regarding the last clip, it is standard procedure for police to charge the victims of police beatings with "assault". The only action necessary is TO BE BEATEN by police: if that happens you WILL be charged with assault, even if you did nothing but get your skull in the way of their baton. This charge gives them leverage to get away with unprovoked beatings.

In one of the greatest attacks on civil liberties in this country’s history, Democratic and Republican Senators voted yesterday to approve a measure as part of the $662 billion defense bill that would allow for the military to hold both citizens and non-citizens indefinitely without trial — even those arrested on U.S. soil.

I wanted to add this to show that the Supreme Court is not on the same page as the Senate:

At this difficult time in our Nation’s history, we are called upon to consider the legality of the Government’s detention of a United States citizen on United States soil as an “enemy combatant” and to address the process that is constitutionally owed to one who seeks to challenge his classification as such. The United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit held that petitioner’s detention was legally authorized and that he was entitled to no further opportunity to challenge his enemy-combatant label. We now vacate and remand. We hold that although Congress authorized the detention of combatants in the narrow circumstances alleged here, due process demands that a citizen held in the United States as an enemy combatant be given a meaningful opportunity to contest the factual basis for that detention before a neutral decisionmaker.

Thank you Brad and other guests on your website for posting this and so much other important events and issues going on in the United States.

Protesters have got to understand that the armed loose cannon cops in riot gear are not the brightest tools in the shed and have no problem using excessive or lethal force on them.

The treasonous lying 1% fcks who increased their militaristic powers using the false flag attack known as 9-11 excuse in the Patriot Act law are watching this inside their homes. These treasonous dangerous careless individuals are clearly drafting new policies for all their sellout political representatives in office to declare into law.

This is specifically aimed at any domestic opposition to their rule, however, the outrage of an American majority is unknown.